


The Before And After

by Perfica



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: 1000-3000 words, Angst, Drama, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-11-08
Updated: 2005-11-08
Packaged: 2017-10-14 12:27:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/149234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Perfica/pseuds/Perfica
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes change occurs with the absence of discussion.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Before And After

Even though he didn't appear to be, John Sheppard was a contemplative man. Hours spent solo in the air made the most oblivious man think, so John had learned to appreciate the many different types of silence that filled a person's life.

He knew the difference between the absence of sound both before and after a bullet was shot, and knew that the vacuum wasn't just created by the deafening crack of chemical propellent being released near his ear. In his more cynical days, he used to think of it as the before and after of death.

He knew the heavy weight of expectant silence that blanketed a room while people with the power to tell him what to do and when to do it waited for him to make excuses for his own behaviour.

He'd never learned to like that silence, and was pleased to find less of it in Atlantis.

He'd slowly become addicted to the high buzz of sound that assailed him just before he went through the 'gate, and knew only a true connoisseur of quiet could find the gaps of calm formed between the noise of people preparing for a mission and the low thrum of a puddlejumper powering up.

Antarctica was the pinnacle of silence - pristine, precious, all pervading peace physically manifested in sheets of white and hard blue. Sometimes he woke up with that image in his mind and carried the stillness around with him for the rest of the day.

He knew the silence that fell between breaths, the thick, bile-flavoured pauses that recurred as he watched a fallen teammate struggle with breath, bodies slack with sickness and injury; busy, unobtrusive cells working quickly and quietly to heal, fighting against time and their own natural inclination to give up, fighting against the greatest and grandest silence of all.

When he'd opened his eyes on that first night, body flinching awake as it became aware of a change in his environment, it was on the tip of his tongue to ask Rodney what was he was doing. As his eyes adjusted to the dim lights, he closed his mouth, recognising almost instinctually that this wasn't a time for conversation.

Rodney was covered in a shroud of silence as he sat on the bed beside John's sheet-covered hip. Even though his mouth didn't move, his eyes spoke volumes.

John's brow creased in confusion and his mouth fell open, ready to ask the question, because there was no reason for someone to come to him at night unless there was an emergency, but Rodney's fingers moved through his hair and clutched, and it was almost as if he'd been gagged.

When Rodney leant down and kissed him, he let it happen.

He let a lot of things happen that first night; lay flat and didn't fight when Rodney pulled the sheet back, when Rodney ran inquisitive fingers over his chest, when Rodney sucked softly against his ribs. He didn't make a sound when Rodney's hand trailed lower and caressed him, making what was already hard harder still, making John pant wetly in the dull quiet of the room, making John flex and release and pliable, stunned as he stared at the ceiling.

Rodney found his way to the small bathroom easily and returned with a warm, damp towel. John licked his lips and ran through the beginning of a thousand sentences in his mind, but before he could choose the right one, Rodney had left.

After a while, John began to see the pattern. Any time they returned from a particularly difficult mission, any time he or Rodney had been injured, his door would open up soundlessly in the dead hours of the morning, and Rodney would deliver his own brand of life-affirming celebration. After a time, John became more active, more aware of his surroundings and would lie in wait. As Rodney's lips moved over his jaw and down his throat, he would smooth his hands under Rodney's shirt and over his sides, at first hesitantly, then with increasing curiosity and pressure.

The best and worst thing about it all was that they never referred to it in the daylight hours.

After one gruesome mission, which had resulted in John being confined to the infirmary overnight, he lay flat on his back, rigid in equal parts of anticipation and unease that the pattern would repeat. Rodney didn't come that night, and John got fewer hours sleep than he needed.

The first night he was released from Beckett's care, he was startled to hear a knock on his door in the early evening. Rodney never knocked, and he never came when there were people awake and about. Still, John swallowed thickly, and opened the door to find one of the commissary staff delivering dinner to him on the express orders of his doctor. John ate what he could, but his mouth was dry.

On the second night he felt well enough to eat in the mess, and as he joked with some of his men, felt Rodney's appraising stare burn into the back of his neck. He finished his meal loudly, slapping Ronan on the back as he said his goodnights. He paced in his room until the sun of Atlantis began to edge over his balcony and collapsed into bed, angry with himself for being so needy. He wondered how well he had to be before Rodney paid him a visit.

On the third night he showered, shaved and sat propped up against the wall, reading until his eyelids drooped. He slumped down, managing in his dozed state to fold over the corner of his current page and resting the book on the small, cluttered table beside his bed, lights dimming in answer to his subconscious wishes.

He woke to the feeling of a warm, wet mouth covering his lips, and fine hair under his hand, and realised that his fingers had began to caress Rodney's nape while he was still asleep. Rodney had removed his shirt, and John slid his palm down the broad naked back, thumb bumping over bony protrusions of spine. Rodney made a noise like muted whimper, and John grunted his pleasure, the two distinct sounds echoing and repeating over their tongues.

His hips thrust restlessly as Rodney moved back and down, curling onto his side, forehead pressed into John's stomach, careful hand guiding John's knee to rest on his shoulder, a semicircle of heat and air forming and moving over his pubic hair. John let out a bleat of shock and Rodney soothed him with a large, gentle hand that rubbed up over one cheek and down the other, ghosting over his taut thigh, encouraging him to push up. Wrapped around Rodney's body, John's eyes and mouth opened wide as he stared at the wall, as he felt Rodney suck him sweetly and slowly. The sound of his heavy breathing filled his ears, the hard and fast beat of his heart pulsing as he came in Rodney's mouth. He was sweaty and sticky and Rodney licked him clean.

He realised that Rodney's head still lay under his hand and tugged at his hair, urging him up. He didn't like the look of distress in Rodney's eyes so he kissed him hard, thoroughly, worming his hand down the front of Rodney's pants, finding him slick and ready and feeling so good in the palm of his hand that John had to pull him off. When Rodney came, he did so with his eyes shut. John knew, because his eyes were open.

He fell asleep with his fingers curled protectively around Rodney's dick and woke up alone.

After the latest mission, where John had smiled widely at the pretty women that populated the peaceful village where they'd traded for food, John felt the weight of Rodney's stare on him again, but continued to flirt. The feeling of the sun on his shoulders and the sounds of happy families around him made him push his confused feelings to one side, never to be brought out in the light of day. He was fine, he was content, he was happy with the noise.

Rodney's eyes didn't meet his as they walked back to the jumper, and John heard the sound of a door closing.

That night, even though no one was hurt, John waited for Rodney. When he hadn't arrived by 4 a.m., John took off his watch, put on his shoes, switched off his bedside lamp and walked out the door.

He stood outside of Rodney's room, a thin sliver of light shining under the door that told him Rodney was there.

He rested his hand against the forbidding door, silently willing Atlantis to let him in. As the door opened, and Rodney sat up suddenly over his laptops, John stepped inside.

The door shut behind him. Rodney's mouth was bitter-twisted and his eyes dared John to make his excuses.

John smiled, relieved. Even though he hadn't planned it on the way over, he found that he had a way to break the silence.


End file.
